Yul Brynner

Took up acting after a serious accident curtailed his career as a circus acrobat. Brynner moved to America in 1940, failed a screen test at Universal in 1947 because he looked "too oriental" and gave...
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Veteran actress Anita Ekberg has died, aged 83. Ekberg passed away on Sunday (11Jan15) at a hospital in Rome following a series of illnesses, which left her wheelchair-bound. The cause of death was not disclosed as WENN went to press.
The Swedish-born actress is best known for her role as Sylvia in Federico Fellini's classic film La Dolce Vita, appearing in one of the movie's most iconic scenes, wading through Rome's Trevi Fountain in a strapless dress.
She appeared in numerous Hollywood films including War and Peace with Audrey Hepburn and 4 for Texas with Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, and was even considered to play the first Bond girl in Dr. No, but lost the role to Ursula Andress.
Ekberg was also known for her string of relationships with Hollywood's leading men and was linked to stars including Errol Flynn, Yul Brynner and Sinatra.

Actor Chris Pratt is in talks to join Denzel Washington in the long-awaited remake of The Magnificent Seven. The Guardians of the Galaxy star is in the early stages of negotiations with studio executives at MGM to appear in the Antoine Fuqua action film, a revamped version of John Sturges' 1960 original, which featured Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson and Yul Brynner among a group of elite gunmen tasked with protecting a small Mexican village from an invasion of bandits, according to Deadline.com.
Washington was tapped to re-team with his Training Day director Fuqua over the summer (14).
The Magnificent Seven film has been on MGM's slate for some time, with Tom Cruise previously set to appear alongside Matt Damon in 2012.
An early draft for the reboot was penned by True Detective writer Nic Pizzolatto and has since been reworked by The Blind Side screenwriter John Lee Hancock.

Japanese actor Ken Watanabe is set to make his Broadway debut in a revival of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's The King And I. The Inception star will team up with Broadway favourite Kelli O'Hara in the musical about the relationship between the King of Siam and a British schoolteacher, who he enlists to tutor his wives and children.
The play will be directed by Bartlett Sher and will begin previews at the Vivian Beaumont Theater in New York in March, 2015.
The original stage show was adapted in 1951 from Margaret Landon's novel Anna and the King of Siam and featured Yul Brynner and Gertrude Lawrence.
It won Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Actress and Best Featured Actor and spawned a 1956 film, for which Brynner reprised his role as the king and won an Academy Award.

Actor Denzel Washington is reportedly in talks to re-team with his Training Day director Antoine Fuqua on The Magnificent Seven remake. Tom Cruise originally signed on to appear alongside Matt Damon as one of the gang of gunslingers in MGM's version of John Sturges' 1960 film, but dropped out of the project last year (13).
Now movie executives are hoping to reunite Washington and Fuqua for a script rewritten by The Blind Side director John Lee Hancock.
The original movie, penned by True Detective writer Nic Pizzolatto, starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter and Horst Buchholz as seven renegades who are recruited to protect a Mexican village from an invasion of bandits.
The Magnificent Seven was itself a remake of Akira Kurosawa film Seven Samurai and was followed by three sequels - Return of the Magnificent Seven, Guns of the Magnificent Seven and The Magnificent Seven Ride Again.

Tony Award-winning composer Mitch Leigh has died at the age of 86. Leigh suffered pneumonia and complications from a stroke and passed away on Sunday (16Mar14) in New York.
He began his career as a jazz musician and wrote jingles for TV and radio commercials.
In 1965 he co-wrote the musical Man of La Mancha, which went on to earn five Tony Awards, including a Best Original Score honour for Leigh.
Following the success of his Broadway debut, Leigh produced and composed several other stage productions, including Chu Chem and Home Sweet Homer and The King and I with Yul Brynner.
Leigh was married to painter Abby Leigh and they had three children. His daughter is director Eve Leigh.

Actor Tom Cruise has dropped out of a planned remake of The Magnificent Seven due to scheduling conflicts, according to a report. The Mission: Impossible star signed on in 2012 to appear alongside Matt Damon as one of the gang of gunslingers in MGM's version of John Sturges' 1960 film, but he has since withdrawn from the project.
Cruise's exit isn't the only change in the film's development - The Blind Side director John Lee Hancock has been recruited to rewrite the script for the film, according to TheWrap.com.
The original movie, penned by True Detective writer Nic Pizzolatto, starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter and Horst Buchholz as seven renegades who are recruited to protect a Mexican village from an invasion of bandits.
The Magnificent Seven was itself a remake of Akira Kurosawa film Seven Samurai and was followed by three sequels - Return of the Magnificent Seven, Guns of the Magnificent Seven and The Magnificent Seven Ride Again.

Actor/director James Franco is preparing to tackle a second film adaptation of William Faulkner's work after receiving favourable reviews for his take on the writer's acclaimed novel As I Lay Dying. The star teamed up with his pal Matt Rager to adapt the story and it was warmly received when he unveiled the drama, which co-stars Danny McBride, at the Cannes Film Festival in France earlier this year (13).
He has now set his sights on turning Faulkner's 1929 classic The Sound and the Fury, about a family of Southern aristocrats who fall on hard times, into a film, which he plans to direct and star in, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Franco has already penned the script with Rager and he is hoping to recruit Mad Men star Jon Hamm to portray the family patriarch, Mr. Compson. McBride and Franco's actor brother Dave are also expected to be cast.
The star is keen to begin production on The Sound and the Fury this autumn (13), but admits there are still some funding issues to straighten out: "We're in pretty good shape (financially), but there are a few more things that have to happen before we're good."
The Sound and the Fury was last adapted for the big screen in 1959 by director Martin Ritt, with Yul Brynner in the lead role as Jason Compson.

We had more questions leaving the theater after seeing Iron Man 3 than Tony Stark has mechanical suits. Some just can't be answered. Like, how did Guy Pearce's Aldrich Killian get the funding to fuel and equip a fleet of helicopters, commandeer a shipyard, stage faux terrorist attacks, and maintain a Miami pleasure palace? Wasn't the fact that he didn't get funding from Tony Stark a catalyst for his vendetta? And why the heck didn't Marvel decide to make Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts their first female superhero? We're not even going to attempt to tackle those particular headscratchers. Luckily, there are still eight juicy questions we very much can answer. Consider this your obligatory SPOILER warning, because we're taking on major plot points from Iron Man 3, including the ending and the future of the franchise.
1. How Does Extremis Work Exactly? Considering just how central it is to the plot and its primary villains, it's a little disappointing how nebulous a concept "Extremis" really is. The idea was introduced by comics author Warren Ellis in his 2005 Iron Man: Extremis series, the Iron Man story that's credited in large part for reviving interest in the character and establishing the aesthetic template of the three movies. In that comic, as in in Iron Man 3, frustrated bioengineers Aldrich Killian (Pearce) and Maya Hansen (Rebecca Hall) developed a medical treatment, involving injections that would require the test subject to be strapped-down Frankenstein-style, to "hack" into an individual's Body Recovery Center in the grey matter of the brain and artificially increase the body's rate of repair following incurred traumas. Theoretically, it could render the test subject invulnerable to any harm, much like a synthetically-induced version of Wolverine's rapid-healing mutation. (A shame that Fox has the rights to the X-Men property or that connection could have been made explicit.)
However, Extremis proved extremis-ly dangerous and not every test subject was capable of withstanding the transformation it offered. Some apparently just exploded, and so, in the movie, Killian and Hansen tried to deflect attention away from the faultiness of their product by creating a fictional terrorist, the Mandarin, who would assume responsibility for the blasts. Extremis is pretty conceptual and its logic isn't entirely consistent. There doesn't seem to be a formula for why some people adapt to it and others so violently reject it. Not to mention there's no explanation whatsoever for why it allows Killian to breathe fire.
2. What Is Westworld and Why Did Tony Stark Make a Joke About It? Westworld was a 1973 thriller written and directed by Jurassic Park scribe Michael Crichton and starring Yul Brynner. It was about a dystopian amusement park geared for adults in which visitors are menaced by animatronic cowboys. So when Tony Stark called one of Killian's henchmen "Westworld" he was basically saying that he found that guy to be wooden and personality-lacking, yet indestructibly formidable as an opponent.
3. How Is It That Robert Downey Jr. and Guy Pearce Are So Incredibly Buff? The answer is pretty simple. They don't just train for each individual movie they're in, but rather they maintain a high level of physical fitness at all times. (Or maybe those green health shakes Tony Stark is always drinking in the movies have something to do with it.) Pearce actually entered bodybuilding competitions as a teen. "I was quite a thin kid, so if I put on any muscle, you can see it...I entered [a bodybuilding competition] and I won," Pearce told Muscle Works Magazine. "I don’t think I would’ve really followed a bodybuilding path. But I was actually fascinated in a creative way, the fact that you can change the shape of your muscle was fascinating to me; it was like sculpture." Hence why Pearce has amazing definition in almost every movie he's been in since LA Confidential.
4. What Was Up With That Christmas Story Reference? Iron Man 3 executive producer and director emeritus Jon Favreau (who played the mostly comatose Happy Hogan in the movie, and directed the previous two films) was childhood friends with Christmas Story star Peter Billingsley. When Tony Stark turns to a bespectacled kid and says, "I loved you in Christmas Story," they're just making a family joke. In fact, Billingsley even served as a producer on 2008's Iron Man and had a cameo in the film. Since much of Iron Man 3 was set at the holidays, what better time to include a Christmas Story hat-tip to his friend?
By the way, in case you were wondering, that version of "Jingle Bells" that Tony Stark danced to while first summoning his Mk. 42 Iron Man suit was the Bombay Dub Orchestra's Remix of Joe Williams' bluesy take on the carol.
5. What Episode of Downton Abbey Was Jon Favreau's Happy Watching? By our reckoning this was Episode 4 from Season 2 when the Irish-revolutionary chaffeur, Branson, redeclared his love for Lady Sybil, then working as a nurse in the final months of World War I. Who knew Happy was such a romantic?
6. How Did They Shoot Iron Man's Aerial Rescue? Think that scene of Air Force One's passengers getting sucked into the stratosphere was all CGI? Think again. Stunt performers trained in skydiving actually jumped out of a plane to simulate the freefall, except that, unlike their characters, they actually were wearing parachutes. Multiple parajumpers, like stuntwoman Sarah Farooqui, who was the first person Iron Man plucked out of the sky, jumped at once and attempted to link arms Barrel-of-Monkeys-style in the sky above Oak Island, North Carolina, which subbed for Miami.
7. How Many Different Accents Has Ben Kingsley Had In His Career? Just keeping it limited to his movie career, Kingsley has demonstrated at least 10 different accents: Indian (Gandhi/The Love Guru), Arabic (Harem), Russian (Testimony), Yiddish (Bugsy), German Jewish (Schinder's List), Italian (Parting Shots), Iranian/Persian (House of Sand and Fog/Prince of Persia), French (Hugo), Cockney (Iron Man 3), Baptist Preacher (Iron Man 3). And the last two are while playing the same character!
8. What Is the Future of the Franchise? As of right now, there isn't an Iron Man 4 in the works. It makes sense, really. Iron Man 3 wrapped up Tony Stark's four-film arc (including The Avengers) pretty neatly, with him accepting the transformation of his values that had come with being Iron Man while rejecting the idea of being a superhero because of how it endangers his loved ones. He blew up his suits, finally had that shrapnel removed from his chest cavity, and seemed poised to embrace the good life.
But don't expect to see Tony Stark out of the suit for too long. In an interview with SuperHeroHype, Marvel Studios Head of Production Kevin Feige said, "We’re not developing Iron Man 4. Currently, as you may imagine, Iron Man is a big part of Avengers 2 and that’s what we’re focusing on and what Joss (Whedon) is focusing on. So where we go after that remains to be seen, but certainly, Avengers 2 being the next appearance, the next storyline for Iron Man. Do I think there will be another Iron Man movie? Of course I do. Who will be in that movie and who will be a part of that movie? Who knows? And how far down the line will it be? Will it be right after Avengers 2, will it be a few years after Avengers 2? Who knows?"
Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt
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Quick: who are the six biggest movie stars you can think of, not including Tom Cruise? Start compiling your list, because MGM is developing a remake of the 1960 classic Western The Magnificent Seven (which itself was a remake of the Japanese film Seven Samurai). Cruise is attached to star in the project, which focuses on a septet of gunslinging heroes who band together to defend a Mexican peasant village from malicious oppressors.
The original film featured cinematic greats like Steve McQueen, Yul Brynner, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, and more. All big names that became even bigger after this movie. So who would make up today's unstoppable team?
There are plenty of names that come to mind when you think of big Hollywood heroes. If you want to take this route, your cast might look something like this: Will Smith, George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Bruce Willis and Leonardo DiCaprio. You're permitted to substitute Matt Damon, Mark Wahlberg, or Robert Downey, Jr., just so long as you don't have three Departed stars or three Ocean's Eleven stars in there at once. Them's the rules.
There are also a few figures on the rise who might soon reach the stature of the aforementioned; actors who are worthy of consideration for projects like this. Accepting that established star Cruise will lead the pack, the "alternative team" has a wider variety. Michael Fassbender is one of the few "must haves." Fassbender's Inglourious Basterds costar Christoph Waltz deserves a spot, so long as he can try his hand at cowboy talk. And Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who has rapidly re-engaged the public with his thespian charms, wouldn't do so bad under a ten-gallon hat. Next: Anthony Mackie, who might be one of Hollywood's greatest secret weapons. Then there's Philip Seymour Hoffman, who might not fit the build of a cowboy, but can play the attitude like nobody's business. Finally, a twist: Jesse Eisenberg. I sincerely think that the world is waiting to see just how much he has up his sleeve beyond anxious nebbish. The boy's got talent, and he's my final pick.
Who makes up your ideal Magnificent Seven?
[Photo Credit: David Edwards/Daily Celeb]
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[Variety]

The 79 year old is the last surviving member of the main cast of the 1960 Western, which also starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson, and he has now signed up to appear in a new independent film called The Magnificent Eleven.
The job will mark Vaughn's first feature project in a decade.
In the original film, which was a remake of Japanese movie Seven Samurai, Vaughn played a good guy gun slinger, but in the new picture, he will tackle the role of a villain called American Bob.
Vaughn tells Britain's Daily Mail, "I like any kind of bizarre comedy and that’s what this is. I like playing sociopaths and psychopaths who are also funny. It’s very cleverly written with a lot of oddball gags. I have a line in one scene where I say to this guy who was a tiler, 'I’m giving you a chance to live for one reason - because you did such a good job on my bathroom'."
Vaughn will next be seen playing a role on the U.K.'s longest running soap opera, Coronation Street.

Recreated his signature role in "The King and I"; received Best Actor Oscar

Summary

Took up acting after a serious accident curtailed his career as a circus acrobat. Brynner moved to America in 1940, failed a screen test at Universal in 1947 because he looked "too oriental" and gave the first of 4,625 performances (over the course of many revivals) as the King of Siam in the hit Broadway musical "The King & I" in 1951. Brynner recreated the role for the 1956 screen version, winning an Oscar as Best Actor, and subsequently began a successful starring career in filmsTrading on his unidentifiably exotic looks and somewhat imperial manner, Brynner played a succession of royals, secret agents and gunslingers, notably in "The Magnificent Seven" (1960) and "Westworld" (1973).